Design with the Other 90%: CITIES

Organized by Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution and co-hosted with Mercy Corps

CraftPerspectives Lecture: Cynthia Smith

Cynthia E. Smith, Curator of Socially Responsible Design at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, provides an overview of the design, thinking, approach and frontiers of invention shown in Design with the Other 90%: CITIES. September 26, 2012.

Rethinking Shelter: Teddy Cruz

August 17, 2012 – January 05, 2013

Curated by: Cynthia E. Smith, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

Presenting Sponsor:

For the first time in history, the majority of the earth’s approximately seven billion inhabitants live in cities. Close to one billion people live in informal settlements, commonly referred to as slums or squatter settlements. Experts estimate that by 2030 this number will double, pushing beyond the capacity of many local institutions to cope.

Lured to cities in search of work or fleeing conflicts and natural disasters, urban migrants suffer from insecure land tenure, limited access to basic services such as sanitation and clean water, and crowded living conditions. At the same time, these informal cities, full of culture and life, increase opportunities to create solutions to the problems they face.

Design with the Other 90%: CITIES is the second in a series of exhibitions organized by Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum’s curator of socially responsible design, Cynthia E. Smith, that demonstrate how design can address the world’s most critical issues. The ground-breaking first exhibition in the series, Design for the Other 90%, opened in 2007 and focused on design solutions for the majority of the world’s population not traditionally served by the professional design community, and was on view in Portland at the Mercy Corps Action Center in 2009.

Design with the Other 90%: CITIES, on view at both Mercy Corps and Museum of Contemporary Craft, explores innovative approaches in urban planning, sustainable design, affordable housing, entrepreneurship, non-formal education, and public health happening in these communities to ensure their residents a brighter future. CITIES features sixty projects, products, and proposals, organized into six themes, that shine the spotlight on communities, designers, and architects, as well as private, civic, and public organizations that are working together to address the complex issues arising from the unprecedented growth of informal settlements in emerging and developing economies.

Challenging, multifaceted, and ultimately hopeful, CITIES asks the question—how can governments, organizations, communities, and individuals collaborate at all levels to foster and accelerate innovation for healthier, more inclusive and resilient cities in the most populated parts of the world?

Exhibition Themes

On view at Museum of Contemporary Craft

Adapt
Solutions that help residents of informal settlements respond to challenges facing their communities.

Exchange
Solutions that promote the exchange of design knowledge between informal settlements and formal cities.

Include
Solutions that seek to include those who have been marginalized by the established city, especially the poor, women, and youth.